With an embedded lending platform, you can easily provide your students with seamless access to multiple lenders.

As more students seek post-pandemic career skilling and re-training, over 80% of students will need to  rely on financing to help cover their tuition costs. This challenges schools to handle the burden of managing multiple financing offers that meet the needs of their students across the financial spectrum and in different locations.

There’s an easier way to take care of your students’ financing needs. 
In this post, we’ll break down how you can seamlessly offer multiple lending options from the providers of your choice, through a standard application, and handle post-payment management, including disputes, reconciliations, and reports. This way you can focus your time and energy on providing a first-class education, while letting a platform take care of your student financing offer.

Providing Multiple Financing Options – Opportunities and Challenges

Consumers increasingly expect a choice of payment options at the moment of purchase. Lenders typically specialize in a specific lending product, and type of customer for example prime, near-prime, or subprime, and geography. This means that to meet the needs of all students, schools need to integrate more than one lender into their offer. However, this presents significant challenges:

• Integrating lenders is a complicated and time-consuming process. Integrating multiple lenders even more so.
• Schools face the headache of managing reconciliations, disputes, refunds, and other post-care processes for each individual lender.
• Schools are left without alternatives if a lender adjusts their terms or goes out of business.
• Students are required to make multiple applications, each with its own requirements, which is frustrating and can also affect credit scores.
• School administrators, admissions counselors, and financial aid staff have to learn how to use multiple lenders’ systems – everyone with its own processes.

Once these challenges are overcome, and students have quick and easy access to personalized financing that offers them flexibility and choice, schools benefit from improved approval rates, increased average tuition value, and more enrollments.

What Schools Need From a Multi-Lender Financing Platform

Schools require a consumer financing solution that frees them up to focus on the day-to-day running of their business and provide students with the best possible education. Their main concerns for a financing solution are that it:

• Offers a seamless and smooth experience that connects schools, lenders, and students.
• Includes a simple prequalification process that gives students peace of mind and provides an excellent customer experience.
• Generates high approval rates, resulting in higher conversion.
• Supports all lending activity, including reconciliation, disputes, customized reports, and communication with lenders.
• Is risk-free and eliminates balance sheet risk.

The most efficient way to overcome these challenges is through a multi-lender platform embedded within the student’s journey that offers a seamless financing experience for both the student and the school.

Why Meratas is the Leading Multi-Lender Financing Platform for Schools

Meratas is the only platform that connects schools, lenders, and students seamlessly, embedding a complete private financing solution into the student journey. Meratas’ network of over 80+ national lenders covers the entire student financial spectrum from prime to subprime and also educational and personal loan options.

Students simply need to complete a quick application and the platform will search for the best financing offers using a ‘waterfall’ method starting with prime lenders that offer the best terms, followed by near-prime, then subprime loans, or even school offered payment payments where students have even more choice. Within seconds, students are offered the best financing options based on their unique financial needs and preferences.

The Meratas platform offers the easiest and most efficient solution for schools too. It’s quick to integrate and easy to use as it enables end-to-end management of the entire financing process, including running multiple inhouse payment plan options built around flexibility towards your students’ unique needs.

How Meratas Can Benefit Career Schools

• Increased enrollment: By offering multiple financing options, schools can make it more affordable for students to attend. This can lead to increased enrollment and revenue.
• Improved retention: Students who are able to finance their education are more likely to stay enrolled and complete their degree. This can improve the school’s graduation rate and reputation.
• Enhanced student experience: Meratas can help schools provide a more seamless and personalized financing experience for students. This can make the process of applying for and receiving financing more convenient and less stressful for students.
• Reduced administrative burden: Meratas can help schools automate and streamline the financing process. This can free up staff time to focus on other priorities.
• Improved data insights: Meratas provides schools with insights into their financing data. This can help schools make better decisions about their financing programs.
• Scalable: Meratas’ platform is scalable, so it can grow with the school’s needs.
• Supportive team: Meratas has a team of experts who can help schools get started with the platform and answer any questions they may have.

Are you a school that’s looking to improve your enrollment, retention, and student experience? Meratas can be a valuable tool in your toolkit. Click here to get started!